Hints file when forwarding unnecessary in BIND 8.2.x?

[Tarun Bhushan]

>> Much to my surprise and delight, my BIND 8.2.1 name server configured with 
>> global forwarding does not seem to require a hints file.  No log message 
>> about the lack of root name servers is emitted at startup and the server 
>> appears to resolve anything just fine.  This is a recent change.  Is it 
>> this one?
>> 

We have recently put in a new BIND 8.2.1 name server (on Solaris 2.6). This name server has no direct access to the Internet, has a standard hints file and has options { forward only; }; configured with a list of forwarders. The latter is the same IP address repeated thrice - the IP address is that of a firewall whose DNS daemon has access to the Internet.

Name resolution works correctly. However, the log produced by the internal name server has the following message repeated over and over - "check_root: 1 root servers after query to root server < min" - (presumambly because MINROOTS defined in ns_defs.h is set to 2). Is this behaviour correct with our configuration? The snippet from a previous message in this thread seems to suggest otherwise.

Regards

Tarun

Tarun Bhushan
Manager, Internet and Distributed Systems
St.George Bank Limited
Sydney, Australia.
Ph: +61-2-92361716
Fax: +61-2-92361177
Email: bhushant at stgeorge.com.au


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